I'm on 9.10 currently and finally giving some thought to
upgrading as I'm watching the clock wind down. I use the
Default gnome for that instalation. I absolutely love having
the top taskbar/menus/quicklauch icons up above without
cluttering up my window switching panel at the bottom.
Really sad to hear I'm going to be losing that if I ever move
past the next LTS.

I hear you. But, at least you are aware that the clock is ticking. You would
be surprised that some people just let it run out and then wonder why
updates stop.

Yeah, I like the panel at the top, too. I switch KDE and XFCE to the top
and run a dock at the bottom. Some distros like Mint run one panel at the
bottom in GNOME. But everything can be changed in just about any desktop
environment. Finally Ubuntu is getting rid of the bottom panel in 11.04. It
took them long enough. It is the first thing that I do in GNOME, especially
on my netbook which has limited screen size.

You can still install GNOME in 11.04, but it comes with Unity by default.
Then you switch at login to GNOME. However, that won't last forever because
GNOME Shell will replace GNOME 2.x which is what Ubuntu uses now. That has a
bar at the top, but a side menu and no panel at the bottom similar to Unity.

And now Ubuntu is aubergine. It is a slick operating system and Canonical
has big plans for Ubuntu. I am excited about many of them.

But in terms of flexibility you can't beat KDE. I am now running KDE 4.6 and
it is even better. They have cranked it up a bit in terms of the plasmoids
and Activities. I vacillated between GNOME and KDE for years before settling
on one, so at least you could make up your mind, even if it was based on
colour. One of the things that interested me was finding out how many here
use alternate desktops to GNOME.

I played around with a few dock options, but didn't like the vertical
real estate they required or else the "hideaway then pop up" for my
laptop. The docks were fairly useful on my desktop before I turned it
into a home server as it had that nice big screen... I've read about
unity and GNOME Shell in a couple of magazines, and although they
weren't something I was too keen on, I guess they could grow on me...

Docks aren't for everyone. I use them to launch my favourite applications
with one click as opposed to the menu which takes more clicks and time to
search. They also work like the Windows 7 panel showing your open
applications. There are several good choices, but I like AWN the best with
Cairo being a close second. I can use the same bar in both KDE and GNOME
which saves even more time since the menus are structured differently. I
have a big monitor so that helps. On my netbook I have a timy one that hides
away.

GNOME Shell and Unity do not work well with a Dock, at least not for me
because it is more confusing than anything. Also Compiz features are wasted
in GNOME Shell and Unity which will be disappointing for many. I think that
it is going to have to grow on people because it is unlike anything that
most people have used, certainly in Linux and Windows. I am not sure about
the Mac because Shuttleworth is patterning Ubuntu after OS/X or so most
observers think.